For many applications of wirelessly powered nodes, such as internet of things (IoT) or biomedical applications, aggressive miniaturization of the device is critical. Miniaturization is important for biocompatibility (in the case of implantable devices), reducing the cost, ease of fabrication and better reliability of these devices. Typically, different transducers (more than one) are used in wirelessly powered devices for recovering wireless power, and for bi-directional communication with external device(s). Using more than one transducer can increase the size and cost of these devices, and poses a challenge for their miniaturization. The current invention relates to using a single transducer for several functions, mainly for wireless power recovery as well as bi-directional data communication.
Wirelessly-powered, highly-miniaturized implantable medical devices (IMDs) can play a crucial role in eliminating the invasiveness and discomfort caused by batteries and wires in most traditional implants. Miniaturization of implants to mm and sub-mm dimensions can also open up the possibility of having a network of sensor nodes in body for applications such as multisite neural recording and stimulation. However, there exists in the art the engineering problem of efficiently delivering 100's of μW to a few mWs, to depths near ˜10 cm in the body, for miniaturized implants in demanding applications such as: deep brain stimulation (DBS), optogenetics and peripheral nerve stimulation. Besides powering of the implant, many applications would benefit from a bi-directional communication link for control functions and data uplink, and all of this functionality needs to be implemented into a small package for practicality.